Citizen protests $11 million no-bid contract

Grossmont school district says it has been happy with bond program manager

Furthermore, the district said, its lawyers concluded that state law allows districts to award contracts for financial, economic, accounting, engineering, legal and administrative services without a public bidding process. Courts have determined that construction management services also fall into that category.

Carlin said he doesn’t believe the district’s due diligence went far enough.

“There is no way you can get an accurate read on the marketplace by looking at what other agencies are doing, because they are different agencies,” Carlin said.

At least one school bond expert said that while districts aren’t legally required to put contracts out for bid, they will often do so in the interest of transparency.

“What (Grossmont) did was legal,” said Anton Jungherr, the founder and executive director of the California League of Bond Oversight Committees, a group formed in 2006 to provide support for the district-appointed boards that oversee the programs on the public’s behalf. “But I would argue from a best practice point of view, in terms of building confidence, it’s not good. You really can’t tell from the (district) report if they are getting a good deal.

The district serves more than 20,000 students in east San Diego County and operates 13 high schools. The bond program is scheduled to run until 2019, though district officials said they anticipate that it might actually finish in 2021 due to the slow bond market.